


A Man Like Me

by goth_on_ham



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Childhood, Gender Dysphoria, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Trans Character, Transphobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-24
Updated: 2018-03-01
Packaged: 2018-11-04 07:02:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10985835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goth_on_ham/pseuds/goth_on_ham
Summary: Jim just wants to be seen as the man he is now.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was requested to me by an anon. I don't claim expertise on this subject so please forgive any inaccuracies. Jim is a little cruel in this at times, but he has anger issues. Set during S1. Starts as a sort of character study, becomes kind of smutty.

He was named after his mother, but he didn’t want to live up to her name. He wanted to live up to his father’s.

“Wow. Where did all your hair go? Since when did you become such a tomboy?” Uncle Frank ruffled his hair. His mother had finally let him get it cut to a length that he liked. He’d never been so happy, but hearing his uncle say those words made his stomach sink. 

“Actually, she prefers to be called James now.” His mother said, chewing on her thumbnail anxiously. She loved him enough to indulge him, but she still worried about what people would think. 

“Huh?”

“Mmh. Hey, do you want a coffee or something?”

“Sure.” 

He knew what that meant, they were going to go into the kitchen and talk about him in hushed voices. 

—

The first time his father called him ‘son’, it sounded awkward. It sounded like he didn't really mean it, or believe it, but he was saying it because he knew Jim wanted to hear it.

Before then, it was always ‘kiddo’. Or something along those lines.

The second time he called him ‘son', he sounded proud. 

And it made up for the first time.

—

Before he started taking hormones, he hadn’t cared much about sex. He thought he liked girls, maybe, but he could never get close to them. He felt like if he did, he would be seen as one of them. 

He didn’t want that.

So he tried boys, because boys seemed to like him more than girls did and he felt an absence in his adolescent life that he thought could maybe be filled with romance.

But when the boy he was kissing put a hand on his chest, he punched him on the nose and there was blood everywhere. 

He would have apologised, but he couldn’t. He couldn't find the words. Any words he felt like he should say seemed weak and pathetic and he was scared that if he said them, his voice would tremble and he would sound even more like a girl than he already did.

So he didn't say anything. The boy started shouting at him, and he ran away.

—

Years later, and things had become easier. 

No one questioned his manhood, because how could they? 

He was Detective James Gordon of the GCPD. He was a war hero. He was tough. He was strong. He had had beautiful girlfriends and drank beer with Harvey Bullock. 

He was still angry, but in the way that men were supposed to be angry. 

He didn't think anyone suspected, until Ed brought it up. As if it was nothing. He grabbed him by the front of the shirt and slammed him into the lockers. He yelped and squeaked out an apology. 

“How did you know?” Jim growled, making his voice go as low as it could. 

Ed looked like he was about to burst into tears. 

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you.” 

“How did you know?” He repeated, knocking him back against the lockers again. 

“I know that I shouldn’t have brought it up but-“

“But what?” 

Ed would tell everyone. Jim just knew it. 

He couldn’t let that happen. He couldn’t let people know.

Jim had stopped telling people once he reached a point where he no longer had to correct them about his gender. He didn’t want them to know. It was something private. 

Barbara had told him that he didn’t need to be ashamed, and Lee had given him a similar speech too.

He had told them that it wasn’t that he was ashamed, it was just…

He didn’t want people to know.

Wasn’t he allowed to keep the past in the past?

He wanted people to see him for the man he’d become and the man he would be in the future, not the weird, awkward tomboy that he’d been seen as before.

“I saw you at the gender clinic.” Ed said, his voice barely more than a whimper, and Jim didn’t understand at first.

Ed noticed, he elaborated. “I overheard you at the reception, I was just leaving. You didn’t notice me. You said you had an appointment with Dr Matthews. He specialises in counselling for transgender patients and-“

“What the hell were you doing there then?” Jim asked, although he began to understand, but he didn’t want it to be true. 

“He’s my doctor too.” 

Jim let Ed go. He swore under his breath and walked away. 

Ed tried to follow him, but Jim turned around and held a hand out to stop him from coming even a step closer.

“Look, I get it. You’re lonely. You think you’re a freak. You want someone like you to be friends with. I get it. I went through that phase too.” He tried to ignore the look on Ed’s face. It was hard. “But just stay away from me. If people catch onto you, I don’t want them to start asking questions about me as well.”

Maybe that was overkill, but Jim didn’t want to take any chances. He couldn’t let one weirdo ruin the life he’d made for himself.

—

A month passed and Ed hadn’t told anyone about Jim’s secret. 

Jim began to relax. Then, one evening, he came into the men’s locker room and saw Ed sitting on a bench by himself, and he was crying.

“Ed?”

No response, just more tears.

He looked over his shoulder, then once he was sure that no one else was around, he closed the door over and walked towards the weeping man. 

“What is it?”

It made him feel like a jerk, but he just wanted the guy to man up and stop crying. Knowing that Ed was ‘like him’ made him harder on the guy. He knew that wasn’t fair. Or right.

“Miss Kringle. She, uh… Let’s just say… She didn’t take some things as well as I thought she would.” 

Jim understood. Although he wished that he didn’t. “I see.”

“I thought she’d appreciate the honesty. I thought it might help her see how much I like her, that I’d trust her enough to tell her that.” 

Jim understood that too. But again, he wished that he didn’t. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out with Kristen.”

Ed sniffed loudly and lifted his glasses up so that he could wipe his eyes. “I don’t think this means it’s hopeless, it’s just a temporary setback, I just got upset because-“

“Ed.” Jim interrupted Ed’s fast paced rambles with a voice that was meant to be comforting but instead came out stern. “Forget it.”

“But-“

“I mean it. Sure she might come around, but don’t get all tied up in what one woman thinks of you. Find someone else.” 

Ed stared at him and Jim rubbed the back of his neck after a few seconds. He was growing uncomfortable. 

“Jim, do you want to-“

“That’s not what I meant Ed.”

—

It hadn’t been what Jim meant, but somehow, seeing Ed cry in the locker room had brought them closer together. 

It was different with Ed than it had been with the boy all those years ago, but maybe that was because when Ed touched his chest, it was flat. It had taken years, but Jim had eventually reached a place where he felt comfortable enough with his body to let himself be touched, to let himself fuck someone. Ed was a virgin, but he seemed like he felt the same about his own body. He desperately wanted Jim to touch him.

“Jim…” 

Ed didn’t mind having his chest touched, even though he hadn’t had surgery. Jim kissed over it, running his tongue over one of his nipples and making the other man’s back arch. When Jim bit on one of them lightly, he let out a soft squeak that was more adorable than Jim had expected.

Ed’s chest was very small and Jim couldn’t help but feel a dull flicker of envy at that. It would have made things a lot easier for him in the past if he’d been built like Ed. However, it was impossible for him to dwell on his jealousy for long, Ed was making such gorgeous sounds that it was impossible to brood.

“Oh Jim, I’m going to… Please don’t stop…” Ed’s long, slender legs wrapped around Jim’s waist. Jim smiled roguishly and began to touch Ed like he would touch himself. The taller man stared to come undone in a matter of seconds. He clung to Jim desperately, hands trembling, and he called out Jim’s name loudly as he came.

Every body was different, but Ed’s was more like his than anyone else that he had slept with. That had its perks. 

Perhaps, being a man like Ed wasn’t all bad.


	2. A Man Like You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, I didn't intend to write a follow up for this. However, it was requested a few times, and I happened to have an idea for it. The same warnings apply for this chapter as before, with an added one for mental illness being a theme in this part.   
> Follows events of s2 and s3 to an extent, but obviously goes a bit differently.

They didn’t last.

Jim broke it off.

He regretted it as soon as the words left his mouth, but he forced himself not to take them back. It was for the best.

“You need help.” He told him.

Ed’s mouth hung open slightly, and for a moment, Jim wondered if he was going to cry. Then his mouth closed, jaw tensed, and Jim wondered if he was going to hit him instead.

He didn’t.

He didn’t say anything. Hurt and betrayal and anger made his eyes glow in a dark sort of a way. They seemed to light up and fade to black all at the same time. Jim sighed heavily. 

“I thought I could help you with this, but it’s not about… You know. It’s more than that.” A sliver of Jim felt like he should stop talking, but most of him wanted to explain, wanted to justify. Ed saw a part of him, understood a part of him, that few had ever. Maybe no one had before. He didn’t want them parting ways with Ed thinking he was a heartless jerk. “I’ve been to some dark places, I think everyone like us has, probably everyone in the world actually. But not like you have. I don’t know what you’re going through, and you need something I can’t give you.”

It took a moment, but then, Jim finally got a response from Ed.

A soft, irritated huff, and his expression relaxed, changing completely in an instant, almost as if there was another man sitting across from Jim now.

“Wow.” The other man shook his head from side to side, then he laughed derisively. “You know, I should have guessed you’d do something like this, but we wanted to give you a chance.”

“We?”

“Get lost, Jimbo. I was getting bored of you anyway.”

Ed tried to correct his slip up but it had been burned into Jim’s mind. He would never forget it. 

“Ed. Listen-” He tried to touch him, place a hand on his arm, but Ed, or whoever he was now, didn’t let him. 

“I said, get lost.” 

\--

Jim should have tried harder. 

He should have refused to leave.

He should have walked Ed to a clinic and gotten him help  _ that day. _

But he hadn’t.

If it hadn’t been Ed, he thought that it would have been easier for him to do something. Truthfully, Ed’s mental illness scared him more than any other that he had encountered before. 

The two men had little in common. Their personalities and interests were almost opposites. But from the outside, being transgender would seem like a massive similarity to have with someone

If one mentally ill transexual worked for the GCPD and went off the rails, how long until the other did?

Jim could practically hear people asking that question, and it made him feel sick.

It wasn’t that anyone knew about him yet. 

However, he was sure that the press would sniff it out if they thought there was a story hiding somewhere. 

He thought of Barbara, and wondered if she would sink low enough to throw them that juicy little tidbit if the price was right. She hadn’t yet, but perhaps that was because she just hadn’t found the right time to do it.

He slept badly that night.

When he read the newspaper the next day, he realised the magnitude of his mistake. 

Ed had made it to the front page. 

Of course, they didn’t mention it was him. He was still an ‘unknown suspect’, but Jim knew it was him. Who else would rob a bank and leave spray painted riddles in their wake? 

\--

Time passed, and Barbara didn’t tell. Neither did Ed.

Jim kept expecting them to, but they didn’t.

He became convinced that they were holding it off, waiting for the perfect moment. 

Every time either of them made it into the grimy Gotham limelight, Jim’s stomach twisted uncomfortably inside of him.

He practiced denials, explanations, evasive answers, and indignant counter attacks.

None of them calmed his nerves. None of them helped his mental health.

Before he knew it, Ed was in Arkham. He thought of visiting him, but he didn’t dare. He was still scared to be seen with him. He still cared, secretly, but he worried about what people would think if they knew that.

When he had said Ed needed help all those months ago, he hadn’t meant Arkham. It worried him when he thought of what they might do to him in there.

Then, before he knew it, Oswald was running for mayor..

Things moved quickly in Gotham, it had always been that way. The city stagnated in many aspects, but it never had a slow news day. Something, usually bad, was always happening.

Ed was released from Arkham, and everyone knew it was because of Oswald.

After Oswald was elected, Jim saw the pair of them pictured together at social events, at schools, at the various, yet repetitive, photo opportunities a mayor would be scheduled to appear at.

He couldn’t help but wonder to himself if they were sleeping together. Oswald was obviously fond of Ed, and that made Jim uneasy.

Oswald had been fond of him once, Jim couldn’t stop himself from wondering if there was a connection. If Oswald had a ‘type’. If could ‘sense’ their similarity.

He tried to put that out of his mind. He told himself he was being ridiculous.

\--

Ed’s gloved hand twitched anxiously as he held on tightly, too tightly, to his gun. 

Jim stared straight ahead, watching the road, feeling Ed’s nerves radiate off him like heat from a furnace. No. An inferno.

When he pulled over to the decided meeting point, Ed swallowed deeply. 

Jim let his hands slide slowly off the wheel, and Ed watched him. 

“I suppose it’s too late to say I’m sorry.” Jim remarked, more flippantly than he had meant to. 

Ed snorted. 

“Well, I am.”

For a few seconds, things were silent. But Jim couldn’t stand it. 

Usually, it had been Ed who broke the silences between them. Jim couldn’t even count the amount of times he had been in bed with him, quietly enjoying the afterglow, when Ed had just started  _ talking.  _

“You don’t have to do this, Ed. We can still go. I could drive you back to the GCPD, get you help-” 

“No.” His voice was harsher than Jim had heard it be before. He saw his face and expected to see that hard, cold look in his eyes. The one he had seen when he had broken up with him. Instead, there were barely held back tears. “I’m not going back to Arkham. I’m going to find out the truth about the Court. I’m going to find out, be the first one to find out, the truth about them, and me, and-”

“Ed.” 

Ed was holding a gun, Jim knew it was stupid, but he kissed him. 

A surge of protectiveness and longing and feelings he didn’t even know the name for swelled up inside of him.

Somehow, he knew it would be okay. Somehow, he knew if he pushed the gun aside, took it away from him, Ed wouldn’t resist. 

Somehow, it just felt right.

Ed seemed to soften at the kiss, and when he did, Jim was there to keep him from crumbling. He kissed him again and again, as if he was making up for all the months where they hadn’t touched at all.

One of his hands ran up Ed’s side, and when he reached up high enough, he could feel that he wasn’t wearing his usual undershirt. Curious, Jim tentatively stopped his kisses and Ed sensed why.

“Oswald,” He explained. “One of the good things he did for me, before he betrayed me.”

Jim was surprised by that, but he supposed he shouldn’t have been. Oswald had always wanted to do ‘favours’ for his friends. It was his way of attempting to keep them by his side. 

“I see.” Jim moved to touch his chest, but then paused. “Can I?”

Ed nodded. “There’s not as much feeling there now.”

Jim supposed it was selfish of him, but he was almost sorry for that. Ed had always been sensitive there, and he had loved to tease at his nipples and make him whine. 

Still, when he slipped his hand underneath the white fabric of his shirt, ran his palm over the flatter surface and rubbed his nipple with two skilled fingertips… Ed shifted, then whimpered. 

Jim couldn’t help smiling at that.

For a moment, he forgot why they were in the car to begin with. But then there were headlights, and he quickly pulled his hands away, he put them back on the wheel. He cleared his throat as if nothing had happened.

It still wasn’t too late. They could leave. 

They didn’t have to do this. 

Then he turned to face Ed, to tell him this. To give him a chance. 

When he saw the look on his face, he knew it was hopeless. Just moments ago, it was coloured with pleasure and so like the Ed he had grown to love, Now, it was focussed, determined. Pain built up in Jim’s chest, so much he could hardly stand it. 

“Finally.” Ed said, and he gave a last brief look to Jim, and opened the car door.


End file.
